


the oldest profession

by thedevilbites



Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: Dom/sub Undertones, Established Relationship, F/M, Humor, Implied knife play/they like it rough, Mandy/Lip cuteness, Sexual Content, South Side snark, Too much time is devoted to American Psycho, fluff?, prostitute!Mandy, what did you expect of course they do
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-12
Updated: 2020-11-12
Packaged: 2021-03-09 19:54:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,786
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27521872
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thedevilbites/pseuds/thedevilbites
Summary: When they wake up the next morning, Mandy shudders, and starts pulling away from him. It’s automatic. She needs to run runrun—Lip practically dives across the bed to reach her, pins her hands above her head, and makes her come three times before breakfast.So, there’s that.
Relationships: Lip Gallagher/Mandy Milkovich
Comments: 2
Kudos: 15





	the oldest profession

**Author's Note:**

> back with some more mip!
> 
> #mipforlife  
> #mipisthebestshipnameandicannotbeconvincedotherwise

Mandy isn’t one of those South Side bitches.

Well, okay, she _is,_ but not in the stereotypical whoring-herself-out-on-the-street type of way that makes people think of, like, mesh thigh-high stockings and sleazy, sequin dresses vultured second-hand from some preppy little vintage store with sparkling twinkle lights around the OPEN sign.

That isn’t to say that she isn’t a prostitute.

She _is_ a prostitute.

Sometimes.

Very rarely/on occasion/when the need calls for it—newsflash, when you’re below the poverty line as much as she is, the need usually calls for it—but she always makes the client pay in _full_ upfront—none of that ‘half before, half after’ bullshit the customers get away with in movies—and she never gets into a car without a hand stuffed into the pocket of her coat, fingering the pocketknife Lip bought for her because he thought it looked like the one from _American Psycho._

(“Um, Lip?”

“Yeah?” Lip looks pokes his head out into the hallway long enough for her make a ‘what the fuck’ motion with her hands.

“What,” he says, voice muffled as he turns back to rifle through the refrigerator, “No dice?”

Mandy shifts to sit upright on the couch, glances down to get a better look at the knife Lip had gracelessly deposited onto her bare stomach after waltzing right past her to the kitchen, yelling, “It’s like that movie with, uh, Patrick Bateman, yeah?” behind him.

The knife is, well, a standard pocket knife. She flicks it open, admires the newness of the blade before closing it with an insidious click. To be perfectly straight, it looks nothing like the knife from _American Psycho._

“Have you ever even seen the movie?” Mandy yells back archly, in the process of putting her top back on.

When she resurfaces from the wool fabric of her sweater, Lip’s leaning on the dryer, a half-eaten sandwich spread out next to him.

“Well?” She raises an eyebrow at him, fiddling with the smooth metal. The dim ceiling light springboards off the handle, catching her in the eye.

“Mm,” Lip scrunches his eyebrows, as if deep in contemplation. “Not exactly,” he grins, devious, and Mandy has to fight the urge to throw a pillow straight at him.

“Jesus, Lip,” she sighs, only partly kidding, “If you wanted to give me a knife, you could have just, like, _given me a knife._ There’s no need for, fucking—Hollywood movie bullshit, or whatever, okay?”

She stills her hands, looks up at him when he doesn’t respond.

“Lip?”

“You put your shirt back on.” There’s a curious edge to his tone.

“Yes, dumbass, I put my shirt back on,” she snaps, unfazed by the change in conversation.

“And the shirt was off in the first place because…”

Mandy crosses her arms over her chest, suddenly defensive but not sure why, “I like to sleep naked.”

Lip blinks. Opens his mouth. Blinks again.

“You sleep _naked_ on our couch?”

“Yeah...”

“How often?”

“I don’t know,” she shrugs halfheartedly, thinking back, “like, nine, ten, times a week. But, it’s only when I can’t get to your bed, or one of your moron brothers is jacking off in your room.”

There’s a muscle jumping in his jaw. “You’re telling me that you sleep naked. In my bed. _Often.”_

“Yeah, pretty much. What's the big deal? I like naps…” she mutters, trailing off when Lip remains silent.

Lip nods to himself suddenly, decisively, as if he just came to a conclusion, hops off the dryer, swallows, and grabs her hand.

“Where are we going?” Mandy pants, barely managing to grab the knife from the couch cushions as Lip yanks her towards the stairs.

“We,” he pauses on the stairwell mid-step, drumming his fingers against the railing, “are going to have sex.”

Mandy’s lips part, still processing, “Oh.”

“Yeah.” Lip nods again, takes another step, then pauses to appraise her carefully, “A lot.”

There’s a slow ache returning between her legs, and Mandy blushes, just barely, but Lip’s always found a way to catalogue her reactions.

His gaze lingers on her cheekbones, skims down to focus on her legs, then flashes up to her face again, grinning. “Got the knife?”

Mandy flexes her fingers around the handle. “For my protection,” she sing-songs, sliding her hand up between their bodies to twirl it in front of him.

Lip’s smile turns _wolfish._

She drops the knife into his waiting hand, and makes a beeline towards his room, smiling despite herself as he darts after her.)

 _American Psycho_ knife or not, now she’s fully equipped to stab some fucker who gets too ballsy, or handsy, or—just too fucking _close,_ in any way, shape, or form.

And, okay, she does have a sleazy, sequined dress thrifted from a second-hand vintage store, but she’d only gone in because one of her friends from the street corner had practically perforated her eardrums whining about it all night, and she’d eventually let herself get dragged inside.

Besides, green is Mandy’s color, and—and maybe Lip was a fan of it on her, too. Or, off of her, to be more exact, lying discarded somewhere in the depths of his bedroom. Semantics.

Maybe it’s not that she’s _a_ South Side bitch, but that she’s _the_ South Side bitch.

_The South Side Bitch._

Interesting. Mandy’s not exactly sure how she feels about that.

Lip knows how she makes a living.

It’s not like she even tried to hide it from him, really, even on the very first day she’d marched into his room, rent money blown on a pair of matte black heels hanging from one hand and a jewel-bright tube of lipstick in the other, and demanded he help zip up her dress _right fucking now_ because she was stressed and irritated and fucking late to work.

“Work?” Lip closes some weighty, monotonous-looking textbook, and throws it to the side of his bed, “Doesn’t the diner close at seven?”

“This isn’t the fucking diner, _Lip,”_ she hisses his name, fighting the urge to rip at her hair or fidget with the hem of her half-zipped, low-cut dress. God, she wants a cigarette.

“Then what are you—“ He begins, slipping off of the bed towards her, but she snaps her fingers in his face, and cuts him off.

“I’m a _prostitute,_ okay?” she spits, turning around impatiently, one part of her relieved that she’s said it, the other part fucking terrified to turn around.

“A prostitute,” he echoes, but he doesn’t stop walking towards her, and he slips his hands up her back in a smooth, synchronous motion.

Mandy bristles. She really doesn’t have time for this. “Lip—the fucking _dress.”_

“I know, okay? Just—just relax for a second,” One of his hands drags down her back to the zipper, nicking the ridges of her spine, and she flinches on instinct.

“Breathe,” Lip’s telling her, free hand pressing down firmly on her shoulder, and she sucks in a breath, shallow and tattered.

They come more steady when Lip finally zips her up, and she unwinds slightly, leaning back to feel him behind her. He’s warm. Present. Grounding. She tries to focus on that feeling, the pins-and-needles running up her arms from where their bare skin touches.

She waits another second, almost convinced that he’ll dissolve into another one of her hallucinations, but he stays still and solid behind her. Okay, then. Mandy nods once to herself, and steps away from him, bending down to pick up her shoes.

“I need to go,” she murmurs, rising and turning towards the door, “they don’t like to be kept waiting. That’s what Hannah says, anyway.”

“Hannah?”

“Yeah, she’s—it doesn’t matter.”

Mandy ducks out of his room, and Lip follows her as she backs up, stopping at the bedroom door frame as she takes the stairs down two-at-a-time.

“Lip?” She pauses at the front door, looks up at him, “thanks for the dress.”

“No problem. And, uh, stay safe,” he nods at her, holding her gaze and she nods back automatically, more to herself than him.

The door closes with a dull _click_ behind her, but Lip doesn’t move from the top of the stairs for a while longer, staring at the place where she left.

She creeps back into his room, afterwards, strips quickly, and slips under the covers without even telling him she’s there.

Sleep doesn’t come.

She didn’t expect it to, really, after the night she had but—But there’s only writhing emptiness and howling discomfort and just plain fucking _nerves_ waiting for her beneath her eyelids, and no matter how much she clings to him, those feelings won't go away.

Lip wakes up half an hour later, and finds her staring mindlessly into the darkness, eyes blackened and numb, wrapped around his arm like a carnivorous plant.

She hears a soft “Mandy?” and doesn’t respond. He tries again, and she stays blissfully silent. Only when he shifts her slightly to lie beneath him, and hisses, _Mandy, look at me,_ stonily into her ear, does she blink, and look up at him.

“Lip—“ she manages to choke out, before he brings a hand to her lips, silencing her, and then leans down to catch her eyes.

“Whatever you’re thinking, it’s not true,” he says, and then again, “it’s not true,” voice a slow, molasses murmur, as if she didn’t get it the first time.

“Say it, Mandy, say it,” Lip continues, and he sounds raw. Painfully desperate. Ruined. He waits for her shaky nod as she repeats after him: “It’s not true,” a trembling pause, and then, “it’s not true, it’s not true, none of it is true.”

He stays above her, shifting his weight on his elbows, until she fades into silence.

When they wake up the next morning, she shudders, and starts pulling away from him. It’s automatic. She needs to run run _run—_

Lip practically dives across the bed to reach her, pins her hands above her head, and makes her come three times before breakfast.

So, there’s that.

She’s just come home from work, and she can see him waiting on the doorstep from across the block, a disturbingly clear figure in the night.

Mandy waves mockingly at him, casually flicking ash from her cigarette onto the pavement as she walks. Her heels click against the sidewalk, ankles wobbling unsteadily. It’s—nice, she supposes. The steadying _unsteadiness._ Her kind of normal.

She sees Lip grin back at her, a flash of tongue, a sliver of teeth, and she forces herself to blink, slow and steady, focus on putting one foot in front of the other.

Mandy thinks she’s falling in love with him. And maybe—maybe she’s okay with that.

**Author's Note:**

> happy to have hammered out another Lip/Mandy fic! inspiration has struck!
> 
> @thedevilbites on tumblr, come say hi!


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